If we read the Californian’s painting as an aerial landscape, the clay-colored table is the earth, carved up by sprawling, field-like parcels beneath a severe horizon. Above, within a sky-blue band, lines loop like clouds. Or we can read the image as a spottily blanketed beachscape topped by sideways waves. There is an inkwell in front — in command. It is far grander in impact than in inches. It’s the shadowy tower of a child’s sandcastle. Being slightly askew, the bottle stopper animates the object and makes it look more real. The streamlined label, the scene’s whitest shape, as well as the one closest to the viewer, is the painting’s most resounding note. (http://hyperallergic.com/341431/origins-of-originality-matissediebenkorn-at-the-baltimore-museum-of-art/)